ECB XI versus New Zealand – A Lament

TFT is currently undergoing a behind the scenes metamorphosis. We’ll have the new site up and running for the Ashes. One thing we’ve pondered is whether our strapline “the voice of the English cricket follower” still feels right.

One of my suggestions was to change it to “the voice of the English cricket supporter”. I felt this demonstrated our passion for the team, and the fact we mostly concentrate on international matches (although we’d love to do more county stuff if time permitted).

Maxie felt differently, however. He argued that ‘follower’ was more inclusive – for example, it embraces those who have an interest in English cricket but don’t necessarily support the team. We get quote a lot of hits from Australia, India and the United States, and not all of these visitors will be England ‘fans’.

Maxie talked me around. I’m glad we’re sticking with ‘follower’. But not necessarily for the reason he gave (although it’s perfectly valid) …

Today England play New Zealand at Lord’s in the first test of the summer – usually a brilliant occasion I lap up eagerly. This time, however, I’m utterly ambivalent. In fact, I’m so ambivalent that I’m buggering off to France and Belgium for the next few days to see the war memorials.

Consequently – and part of me is ashamed to say it – I can no longer count myself as an England ‘supporter’. I really don’t give two hoots about the result. I’ll be interested to know what happens, of course, and I’ll be keeping an eye on the score, but I’m now firmly in the ‘follower’ bracket. You could say I’m entirely disengaged.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want England to lose. I’ll be supporting the players as individuals. I’ve taken to the likes of Joe Root, Moeen Ali and Jos Buttler in particular. I wish them every success in their careers. Similarly, I wish Adam Lyth (and possibly Mark Wood) the best of luck on their debuts, and hope Jimmy Anderson takes a five-for.

However, I’ve come to realise that the ‘England team’ no longer exists (at the current time anyway). It doesn’t belong to the public anymore. Those who run the team do not particularly care about the public: they run the team as their own personal fiefdom. It’s now the ECB XI, not England.

This is not about Kevin Pietersen. Regular readers of this site will know that I wouldn’t put KP back into the starting line-up while Root, Ballance and Bell are scoring runs. The latter has struggled of late, but I’m hoping he can repeat his heroics of the last home Ashes series in 2013.

For me the issue is the competence and morality of the ECB and the cricketing philosophy of the team – something I’ve raged about since 2012.

I’ll deal with the latter first. In the last days of Andrew Strauss’s time as captain, I grew sick of England’s methodical, attritional cricket. I found the four bowler policy mind-numbing after the successes of 2005 and 2009, and I was utterly fed up with the bowling dry philosophy – which only ever really worked against undisciplined sides. Quality batsmen usually have more patience than the bowlers.

I came to dislike Strauss’s captaincy and Flower’s emphasis on statistics. Our attitude on the field also stank – remember the jellybean incident and our bowlers’ body language after dropped catching and miss-fields?

Make no mistake about it. England became the most unpopular cricket team in the world amongst international players. We were despised and I could see why. The 0-3 defeat in the UAE and the 0-2 defeat to South Africa were what we deserved for failing to change our philosophy and attitude.

When Strauss stepped down as captain I hoped it would usher in change. I was wrong. The ECB retained Flower and appointed Strauss-light as captain. Nothing changed at all. With the notable exception of the victory in India, the team were stagnant and going nowhere.

The warning signs were there on the tour to New Zealand and the home Ashes series of 2013. We were struggling to score 400 regularly and our bowlers looked down on pace and exhausted. The Aussies smelt blood. They destroyed us. Surely we were going to get the change we craved now?

Nope. Cook survived. Flower remained on the payroll. A different scapegoat – one who obviously felt the same about the current regime as I did – was found. And typically, the ECB bungled the whole thing.

Next the unthinkable happened: we lost to the Netherlands in the World T20 and Peter Moores was brought back. ‘Best coach of his generation’? You’re having a laugh, right?

Finally, we come to the moral issue. I don’t need to repeat the obvious – and I’m probably preaching to the converted here – but we had ‘right sort of family’ remarks, the ‘outside cricket’ debacle, poisonous leak after poisonous leak, the dodgy dossier, Moores’s sacking, Graves being disingenuous about KP, and now a load of bullshit about ‘trust’ (even though the players weren’t even consulted!)

I admired Strauss as a leader, and respect the man enormously, but I’ve never bought into his nebulous concept of ‘team’. It rubs me up the wrong way. I was a good cricketer at school, represented the Worcestershire junior teams on occasion, but I was never one for motivational talks and team ethics. I didn’t like being nagged: just let me go out, score runs, and stop pestering me.

I find talk of team bonding cheesy and unnecessary. Spirit isn’t something you can force on people. Teams either have it or they don’t. Chemistry between people happens organically. It’s nice to have, but it’s not essential to winning cricket matches.

Consequently, I absolutely despair that after all these years, the men still in charge of English cricket are Strauss, Flower and Alastair Cook. I used to quite like the latter – although I always thought he was somewhat overrated as a batsman – but now I see him as a mollycoddled, petulant, child with an inflated sense of his own value.

I also hate favouritism – those players who suck up to the coaches and make themselves un-droppable as a result – and for me Cook is the living embodiment of that. Did you hear his interview on the BBC yesterday in which he kept calling his boss ‘Straussy’? Talk about cosy.

So where does this leave me? The answer is no man’s land. The England cricket team no longer represents me, and I can no longer feel any warmth or affection for it.

I’ll be following the team closely, of course, and hoping for signs of life, but until the ECB reconnects with the public, and the team shows some bloody joie de vivre, don’t expect me to cheer for them like a puppy dog that can’t think for himself.

Feel free to add your comments on today’s play below. But please, no cheerleading or talk of shiny new eras. I might vomit.

James Morgan

@DoctorCopy